Katsuyori Takeda

Katsuyori Takeda (1546-3 April 1582) was the daimyo of the Takeda clan from 1574 to 1582, succeeding Takejiro Higa. The son of Shingen Takeda, he came to succeed his father after it was revealed that his father had died in 1573 but employed a kagemusha (Takejiro Higa) to pretend to be him to keep order in the clan. Katsuyori was decisively defeated at the 1575 Battle of Nagashino and killed at the 1582 Battle of Temmokuzan.

Biography
Katsuyori was born in 1546, the son of Shingen Takeda. Katsuyori was his eldest son, but Shingen preferred Katsuyori's own young son Takemaru Takeda, and Katsuyori had not smiled since his father passed him over in the succession. Katsuyori was a weak leader, and at the 1573 Siege of Noda Castle his suggestion to inform his father about the breaking of the Tokugawa aqueduct was ignored. When his father died after the siege and kagemusha Takejiro Higa pretended to be him, Katsuyori became angered, finding out. He decided to lead an army out to fight the Tokugawa at the Battle of Takatenjin, and Takejiro had to send reinforcements to prevent the Takeda from losing the battle. In 1574 Katsuyori became the daimyo after Takejiro's act was discovered, and Katsuyori rashly decided to lead his army out against Nobunaga Oda and Ieyasu Tokugawa at the Battle of Nagashino. The Takeda army was destroyed, and in 1582 he was attacked at Temmokuzan. Defeated there, he committed seppuku.